


Spice Burn

by Starcross



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Awkward Flirting, Bonding with your would-be assassin because why not, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Rare Pairings, This is Not what Target is supposed to mean, unlikely friendship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-03
Updated: 2017-05-03
Packaged: 2018-10-27 01:56:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10799289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starcross/pseuds/Starcross
Summary: Jango Fett visits Senator Amidala in her cell while she is waiting for her execution on Geonosis.Complications ensue.





	Spice Burn

**Author's Note:**

> Because of course I had to ship my two favs together at some point.  
> Also, don’t tell me that nobody thought of taking Padmé’s magical hairpin away.

The dust glittered crimson in the central light shaft, swirling in patterns with the lazy breeze from above.

Padmé had been staring at it for a full minute now.

It was very pretty, she admitted. In other circumstances, she might even have found it relaxing.

(Truth be told, the crude stone walls and dimmed light reminded her of a renowned spa on Coruscant, where the very wealthy came to escape from the sophistication of their daily life, and paid an outrageous amount of money to experiment simplicity and rusticism. The irony wasn’t lost on her, but dear Rizel had the most agile hands Padmé had ever encountered, and he always kept a little pot of his secret oil for her. Silk-soft skin and relaxed shoulders were worth living a cliché.)

Across the cell, someone cleared their throat. She ignored them just as firmly as she had for the past half-hour.

The sound was strangely muffled, probably from the fine sand that littered the floor. She had a thought of compassion for Anakin.

(It had taken her a while to understand why on earths someone would pick grinded rocks as their personal archenemy, until she had remembered that the kid came from a desert planet. The sand storm they had weathered during their stay on Tatooine had left her with puffy eyes, an itchy scalp, and clothes embarrassingly full of those kriffing grains – sand _did_ get everywhere, especially where it had no business getting. She couldn’t imagine that ten years of slaving on that wretched planet would leave anyone with the feeling that sand was _fun_. She wondered what his reaction had been when he had found out about beaches.)

It was good sand, though, she mused as she buried her toes in it. Soft and smooth, with tiny crystals that shimmered lightly when she moved her feet.

All in all, she had to hand it to the Geonosians: their planet had good-looking minerals.

It was a shame that they used the space as a prison, when it could have made a mean underground pool. If she survived this, she would recommend Archduke Poggle a better architect.

Her visitor politely coughed again, and she repressed an annoyed huff.

She was being petty, she knew. Childish, even. But the man had completely ignored her pleas and arguments (and eventually, her shouted profanities) when he had dumped her in there, so she felt entitled to a bit of cold-shouldering.

On the other hand, she was getting seriously bored. Her mind was going in circles, and if she didn’t find something to keep it occupied… Well, she didn’t like where it was headed.

Besides, maybe she would learn something. Or at least, get to insult him again, which would definitely make her feel better.

She sighed deeply, and raised her head.

Her eyes met those of the man standing in front of her, and she waited for him to speak. He didn’t.

The brilliant Senator, former Queen of Naboo and High Representative of the Republic, found that very immature, so she stubbornly kept her mouth shut too.

They stared at each other in complete silence for almost a minute.

He was doing a very good job of maintaining that indifferent façade, she granted. He looked completely impassible, with the only movement on his face the slow and regular blinking of his eyes.

Padmé raised an eyebrow, and for a split second, it seemed like the corner of his mouth twitched.

She decided it counted as a victory.

“So”, she finally said. “This is awkward, isn’t it?”

The bounty hunter tilted his head.

“Why would it be?” he casually asked, as if they hadn’t spent the last thirty minutes in uncomfortable quietness.

His voice was surprisingly affable, and the senator frowned. She had expected him to sound husky and menacing, like the deadly thug he looked like, but he was actually closer to Bail Organa’s velvety tones - on which she had had a persistent phonetic crush since she was fifteen.

(Even today, she had to focus really hard to avoid grinning like a pheromone-stricken tooka every time her friend opened his mouth. Queen Breha was a lucky woman.)

She shrugged.

“I don’t know. You’ve been trying to kill me for the past months, and now we’re here.”

“Now we’re here indeed.”

The silence returned. The walls kept crumbling, the dust kept shimmering, and Padmé kept staring at the armored man, who was standing still on the opposite side of the cell.

“I’m sorry, why am I here?” she asked after a while.

Jango Fett uncrossed his arms, and looked at her pensively.

“Well”, he said as he absent-mindedly scratched an edge off the granular wall. “You did break into a top-secret military facility, while already being a target the Confederation was trying to eliminate. You can imagine it caused some distress to the members of the Leading Council.”

“Oh, no, of course”, she replied unapologetically. “It’s not what I meant. Why am I here, as opposed to being dead? Given the circumstances, I’m surprised you didn’t shoot me on sight.”

“Ah. Forgive me, I hadn’t understood. My employers strongly insisted that I should capture the Jedi alive. I took the liberty of assuming the same requirement would apply to you.”

“Did it?” Padmé enquired with surprise, trying not to let hope tinge her words.

The bounty hunter winced, and his voice was slightly contrite when he answered:

“I’m not going to lie to you, it doesn’t look good.”

“Oh.”

“Sorry.”

“Thanks. I guess.”

Padmé started chewing on her lip, biting off a small piece of dead skin. Her stomach was gargling, and her armpits were itchy. They were silly things to focus on, but right now the discomfort of reality was the only thing standing between her and the overwhelming terror of a premature death.

She felt the knot of anxiety she had fought for the past five hours form back in her throat.

It was stupid to bring this up. She didn’t deal well with fear, she knew that – repressing it strongly and making herself angry instead was her usual method of functioning, but it only lasted so long.

She had been furious for the first hour, wrestling against the restraints when Fett had clamped them around her wrists, trying her best to wriggle free until her skin was raw and bloody. She had calmed down then, pain and exhaustion forcing her to think, to analyze, to do with her mind what her body couldn’t.

It was then that fear had come, insidiously sliding into her guts. There was no way to get out of that cell. She had been stripped from all her hidden tools – the laser ring on her index, the emergency beacon she kept as a back pendant, even the hairpin that Quarsh Panaka, her beloved grumpy captain, had made for her when she had been appointed Queen.

She had calculated again and again how long it would take for reinforcements to come for them. Far as they were in the Outer Rim, even if the Jedi had immediately decided to act upon Obi-Wan’s distress call, nobody would be here before hours.

And given what they had discovered, a Jedi intervention wasn’t even guaranteed. The galaxy was balancing on the edge of war, and revealing that the Separatists had begun building an army would immediately topple them into conflict, without any chance for peaceful resolution.

She was too used to the mechanics of politics to be surprised by their finds; the relationship between the two parties was strained and extremely tense, and the Senate _had_ been openly reflecting on the necessity to build an army to defend their purpose.

If she had been a Separatist, she would have prepared for a potential war too. It didn’t mean that they were actively planning to delve into open conflict.

Still, the general public didn’t bother with these subtleties. It hurt her to say so, but it would be far better for galactic peace to let them handle the situation on their own than to bring in more witnesses - whose interests and loyalty weren’t as clear as they once were. Padmé had never liked the Jedi as an order; while deeming themselves objective beacons of reason, they sure were lacking a lot of analytical skills.

It wasn’t reasonable to ignore emotion. Ten years of political scheming had taught her as much – emotions and personalities weighed far more than plain logic in negotiations.

(Seeing Anakin so fragile and insecure after everything he had already been through as a kid hadn’t helped mollifying her either.)

The Jedi had once been the protectors of peace. Today, they were supposed to be the guardians of the Republic.

So what happened if the Republic was torn apart by civil war?

She had no idea, and she would rather not find out. No, her best chance was to convince the Separatists that she understood their position, and that peace was still possible. How she could do that, though, was beyond her.

Gunray was an obnoxious asshole who would rather lead the galaxy into fiery destruction than listen to her. Dooku was an intelligent man, and he had been a Jedi, too – Qui Gonn Jinn’s Master; but he had also been the one trying to get her killed for the past months, which didn’t bode well for constructive discussion.

So she kept focusing on the small details of her environment, as if it could push back the bigger problem at hand. Her shackled feet were drawing rosacea on the floor, the same pattern that decorated the windows of her rooms on Naboo – she wondered if she would ever get back there, if she would crash on her bed and drink tea with Sabé again, debate over politics and cheesy series with Sheev, and visit her father’s grave in the flowery gardens...

She clenched her jaw so hard her teeth gritted, and she erased the drawing with a kick.

After some time, it was the bounty hunter who spoke.

“Comfortable?”

She shot him a dirty look.

“You know, I wouldn’t have taken you for the cruel and sarcastic type”, she drily replied. “I’m disappointed, mister Fett.”

“What? Oh, no.” The bounty hunter waved an apologetic hand. “I can see why you would think that, but it was a genuine question. Improper restraint can be excruciating on the long term, and you might be here for a while.”

“Oh. My bad.”

“No problem.”

“My arms do ache a little.”

He walked to the chain pulley, and gave her a few centimeters of slack. The restraints were more primitive than anything Padmé had ever seen – plain circles of metal around her ankles and wrists, without any electromagnetic field – but they were efficient nonetheless.

“You hurt your wrists”, he observed.

“Yes”, she replied in the same matter-of-fact tone.

“Do you want something on that?”

“Grease would help.”

“… Help you sliding off, you mean?”

“Well, you asked.”

Fett chuckled lightly, and Padmé glared at him.

“Sorry. It’s not that funny, I suppose.”

 _I’m going to get killed by a far too handsome mercenary in a backwater prison because fucking politicians can’t get along with each other,_ the senator thought. _Of course it’s not funny, you steaming pile of…_

Her train of thoughts was interrupted when something cold slimed against her chafed wrists. The pungent smell of bacta hit her nose, and she frowned in incomprehension.

Fett shrugged, and went back to his position.

_You know what? I’m tired of this shit._

“So”, Padmé asked bluntly. “Are you here waiting for them to confirm that you should kill me?”

She tried to keep her voice steady, but a little tremor of fear made its way through her fake impassibility. Fett had the courtesy to pretend he didn’t notice it, and he answered just as amiably.

“The Council is in a meeting right now. I guess your fate will be discussed at some point.”

“Shouldn’t I at least meet them to defend myself?”

“If they judge it necessary, I’m sure they’ll call for you.”

“Mister Fett, don’t take it wrong, but they are discussing _my kriffing death_. I would be inclined to think that the least they can do is hear me out.”

Fett looked at her with embarrassment.

“I can check, but they… didn’t seem as interested in talking to you as they were with the other Jedi. I’m sorry.”

_So you keep saying, asshole._

Padmé breathed in deeply.

“Fine. Okay. Look, is there any way I could convince you to refrain from doing whatever they have planned, and instead… not do that?”

The bounty hunter shook his head.

“They are my employers. I don’t take bribes or other personal favors. I’m afraid we will have to wait for their decision, milady.”

“You are aware that murdering a senator and two Jedi might bite you in the bottom at some point?”

“Quite. I have fully accepted the risks and consequences of my job.”

“You are a peculiar man, Jango Fett.”

Jango Fett nodded courteously.

Then his holocomm buzzed at his belt, and Padmé flinched.

He switched his earpiece on, and replied in a language she didn’t understand.

She watched anxiously as the man spoke, his voice interrogative at first, then firm and inflexible. It lasted for a few minutes, the unknown dialect flowing harmonious on his tongue.

“Sorry about that”, he finally said as he hung up.

“Well?” inquired Padmé.

“Hmm? Oh, it wasn’t the Council. It was just my son.”

“You have a son?” she exclaimed with genuine interest. “I didn’t know.”

_That’s good. I don’t know how yet, but that’s information I can use. It has to be._

“Yes. His name is Boba.”

“Is he alright?” she asked. “You sounded concerned.”

“No, he’s fine”, Jango replied dismissingly. “He’s just hungry, and… Let’s just say he has alarming ideas regarding appropriate snacks.”

Padmé couldn’t help laughing.

“So you’re the dietetics-obsessed type? Good to know.”

“If only it was about that. No, it’s…”

For a second, he looked like he was hesitating to tell her more. Padmé waited, slightly tilting her head. Fett clearly wasn’t used to talking about his private life, and somehow she felt it was more because of the restrictions of the job than out of personal choice.

He was biting his lip, professional prudence visibly balancing against a very fatherly desire to talk about his progeny.

“He’s decided to learn to cook”, the bounty hunter finally said. “And he’s in a flambé phase, I’m afraid.”

“Oh”, Padmé chuckled. “That does sound alarming.”

“It’s not that I don’t trust him”, Fett hastily added. “He is very skilled. But…”

“Yeah, burning down your employer’s kitchen would be bad for business.”

The bounty hunter nodded.

“It’s even worse than you think. Geonosians don’t have kitchens, and Slave I is a bit cramped. He’s on the Viceroy’s ship for now.”

The senator took a few seconds to imagine the Trade Federation mothership burning down from a cooking incident.

“Well, didn’t that put a smile on your face.”

She begrudgingly returned to the harsh reality where her archnemesis weren’t reduced to ashes by a tiny enthusiastic Fett and his crepe-flambéing pan.

“Sorry. Daydreaming. Flaming stuff runs in your family, it seems.”

She pointed her chin at the flamethrower on the bounty hunter’s forearm.

He patted it fondly.

“Yes. Although I can’t say I’ve ever used this one for culinary purposes.”

“And here I thought you were the creative kind. How old is your kid?”

“He turned ten just last week, actually”, the hunter replied with a fond half-smile.

“Oh, belated happy birthday to him.”

“Thank you. I will pass the message.”

“So what did you tell him exactly?” Padmé asked curiously. “I didn’t understand what language you were using.”

“Ah, that’s Mando’a. I only speak it with him, actually - it’s kind of our thing. And I told him to make a salad instead. That should keep business risks to a strict minimum.”

“You never know”,Padmé dreamily said. “Maybe he could accidentally pour dressing into the reactor and cause a critical failure.”

Fett laughed.

“If he finds a way to wreck that ship with a salad, I’m retiring.”

“Let a girl hope, mister Fett.”

The bounty hunter sat down against the opposite wall, leaning back as he crossed his legs.

“I always wondered”, he said. “What is there exactly between the Viceroy and you? I know he’s the resentful type, but he’s especially intense when it comes to your case.”

Padmé laughed.

“That’s the understatement of the year. He kriffing hates me. Good thing it’s mutual.”

“So what exactly did you do?”

“Hey, he started it”, Padmé sneered. “Invaded my freaking planet on the week I was elected Queen. It was a pretty horrible month, even if it backfired spectacularly.”

“Yes, his plans tend to do that. That explains your feelings, not his.”

“I sued him for it.”

“Hundreds of people do”, Jango countered. “He has a full legal team dedicated to handling those he pisses off - which you have to admit, is some impressive level of commitment.”

“Yeah, he’s a real pro when it comes to wronging folks”, Padmé snorted. “Funny you should mention them. I know his team pretty well, by now. I send them greeting cards on every holiday.”

“I really can’t tell if you’re joking or not.”

“I’m not. We’re on very good terms. I’m the main reason they have a job, after all.”

“Hmm. I think you might be flattering yourself, senator. Believe it or not, you’re not the only person in the galaxy who gets into petty feuds with the Federation.”

“You’ve eliminated enough to know, is that so?”

“It is”, the bounty hunter unapologetically said. “So what is special about you?”

“Everything about me is special”, Padmé casually replied, and Fett laughed. “No, I meant what I said. I’ve sent him in court a little too often for his taste.”

“Oh, come on. It can’t be more than Vicechair Ilres.”

“Twenty-eight times across the last ten years? I lost count of exactly how much I’ve cost him in litigation by now, but we’re talking a nine-figure number.”

Fett stared at her for a second, and whistled softly.

“I take back what I said. How has he put up with you for so long?”

“He hasn’t. You’re not the first assassin to try and get me.” Padmé looked at her hand for a second, memories flashing through her mind - bright blue light in the Naboo sky, the smell of fire, the scream of a black-clad man spiraling down. And the sound, like a horrible crunch.

She raised her head, and added while looking at Fett straight in the eye:

“I shot the last one. And I traced the order back to Gunray with some serious proof. Defending yourself from fund embezzlement is one thing - it’s even fun, to him, I guess; it’s all financial voodoo and bickering in jargon. Ordering a hit on a Republic Senator? Now that’s something else.”

The bounty hunter nodded appreciatively.

“You’re not an easy target, lady Amidala.”

“Nope. He almost made time for that one – in the end, he bribed off enough people to get a dismissal, but it made him reconsider things for a while.”

“Okay, so you’re his political archnemesis, you cost him millions of credits, and you have the annoying tendency to not only survive assassination attempts, but also come back to pull receipts. Is that all?”

“It’s more than enough, don’t you think?”

“I’m a little… disappointed”, the man shrugged. “I thought it was more personal.”

Padmé cleared her throat with an embarrassed look.

“Well…” she hesitantly started.

Fett stared at her intently, a conniving grin slowly colonizing his face.

“Come on, lady Amidala. Share the gossip.”

“I may have hired his partner as a lawyer against him, once.”

“You did _what_?”

“They were going to break up anyway”, Padmé protested. “She just happened to do so the day before the trial, and with enough dirt to leave him zero chance of dodging charges this time. It’s called justice.”

Fett burst out laughing.

“Kriffing hell, senator. Isn’t that level of pettiness below you?”

“He had it coming. I may not work with hired criminals – no offense – but it doesn’t mean I don’t reciprocate the feelings. I hate him too.”

“And so you send gift baskets to his lawyers. You are one of a kind, you know.”

“I know. It would be a shame if I should go extinct.”

The bounty hunter smiled, but he didn’t say a thing.

For a second, it seemed to Padmé that there was regret in his eyes.

\---

His comm vibrated again a moment later, and he waved reassuringly as he switched his earpiece back on. The young woman listened carelessly as Fett proceeded to explain something in Mando’a (cooking instructions, she guessed), using the opportunity to observe the man instead.

He had an interesting face, she admitted. She couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was that kept her attention – there wasn’t anything specific that struck out about him; he had none of Bail’s smooth elegance or Anakin’s troubled energy, nor Palpatine’s strikingly angular features.

Still, there was something.

Maybe it was the contrast. The quietness in his brown eyes wasn’t what you expected to see under his helmet.

Fett’s voice had gone more animated as he talked with his son, which made Padmé smile despite herself. He noticed it, and glanced at her while he scratched his stubble.

“I know”, he said with an embarrassed look once he had hung up. “I get sort of excited when it’s about him. Proud parent syndrome, I guess.”

“Don’t worry about it. It’s pretty cute.”

The bounty hunter chuckled, and Padmé stretched her neck, relaxing a bit despite her uncomfortable position.

“Do you mind if I ask you a question?” she mused. “You don’t have to answer if it’s too personal.”

“Sure.”

“How do you do it? Being a parent while doing your job? I mean, I don’t know much about your life, but it looks about as busy as mine, and even more dangerous. And I have to admit… I don’t think I could balance being a Senator and a mother.”

“It’s complicated”, Jango granted. “And… well, I don’t know everything about your life either, but I’m assuming you also gave up long ago the idea of compartmenting work time and personal time?”

The young woman burst out laughing.

“So long ago. I can’t remember the last personal time I enjoyed without being interrupted by some sort of crisis.”

The bounty hunter smiled.

“It happens all the time to me, too. And you know what the weird thing is? It’s completely infuriating at first…”

“… but then you just capitulate”, Padmé nodded with a knowing look. “And you feel depressed for about a minute at the idea that your life is a weird mess, but deep down…”

“… you like it”, both said in a resigned chorus.

The senator snickered.

“Try and explain that to normal people.”

“You can’t”, Fett agreed. “It takes a special brand of masochism, I think.”

 “Oh, it sure does. A considerable ego, too.”

The bounty hunter made a skeptical face.

“No, I don’t think so. I certainly don’t have one, and I can’t picture you as the egotistical kind, either.”

“Come on, mister Fett. It’s only us here. Look me in the eye, and tell me that feeling irreplaceably competent to the point where people drag you out of bed to solve their problems doesn’t hit your spot.”

Jango Fett wriggled awkwardly where he sat, and a guilty smile finally came to his lips.

“Maybe”, he admitted. “It feels good to be the best.”

“There you go.”

“You are also quite the leader in your own field.”

“I sure am. I don’t owe my influence to my position. For kriff’s sake, I’m just the Senator from Naboo. Have you ever been to Naboo?”

Jango shook his head.

“It’s my beloved home and I am very fond of it, but it’s the backwater of the galaxy. It’s just grassy meadows and flowery palaces and academics fighting each other with essays. We’re not exactly a paramount system in the grand cosmic scheme of things.”

“And yet you are the worst nightmare of the Separatist Council.”

“Because I am a highly-skilled, strong-minded spiteful bitch who would rather give up on sleep for three weeks than let someone get away with injustice.”

“I knew I liked you for a reason.”

“And I still don’t understand how you can manage being a dad with a life like the ones we have. Unless your spouse is doing the primary parenting?”

“I don’t have a spouse”, Jango said with a look she couldn’t decipher. “Boba is… it’s complicated.”

“Oh... My apologies, I didn’t mean to pry.”

“No, it’s quite alright”, the bounty hunter said. “It really is a long and complicated story, but there’s nothing sad about it.”

“That’s a relief. I thought you… lost someone.”

“Never found them is more like it. It’s very selfish, but I wanted a family of my own.”

“Why would it be selfish?” she asked curiously.

Jango sighed, fidgeting with his gloves before he answered:

“You know. That’s supposed to be the thing you wait to do until you’ve found someone, isn’t it?”

Padmé laughed.

“That’s a very human-centric view. And a pretty backwards one, if I may say.”

The bounty hunter looked at her with an amused grin.

“I guess Naboo is a little more modern than Mandalore.”

“Oh, we’re a very traditional folk.  We just got rid of any tradition that could get in the way of people doing whatever the hell they want. Especially when it comes to interpersonal relationships.”

“How do you get rid of traditions?” Fett wondered.

“You pick the ones you like, you tweak them around, and you let the others go forgotten. And in a few generations, you move from a misogynist autocracy to the chillest society in the Galactic Core.”

Some would even say ‘boring’, the senator knew, but boring wasn’t a bad thing for a civilization. Boring meant peaceful.

“And single parents are a thing there?”

“Mister Fett”, Padmé smirked, “Three of my relationships so far have been blessed by the godly veil of Sabathel. The first one happened to be a very loving, very open partnership with one man and two other ladies, who ended up having a kid together. Nobody gives a damn about who you date or not on Naboo. You do you. Single away.”

The bounty hunter smiled as well.

“That’s good to hear. It’s not that I don’t _want_ a relationship, but…”

“Not easy to meet people with that kind of job?”

“You understand, don’t you?” he softly said.

Padmé felt her heart clench a little.

“Yes”, she simply answered.

“Do you miss it?”

She sighed deeply, rubbing her forehead against her knees.

“Not really”, she admitted without raising her head. “Sometimes, but I’m not unhappy on my own.”

“Between you and me”, Fett slowly said, “when you happen to have some free time between jobs…”

“I nap.”

“That’s what I thought. Do you ever pretend that you’re super busy to avoid going out?”

“I’m super busy napping.”

The bounty hunter’s laughter echoed in the cell, and it wasn’t long before hers did too.

“Let’s face it, mister Fett. We are undatable people.”

“And isn’t it a terrible loss for the world.”

“It is”, Padmé agreed. “Hey, it’s not our fault if all those lucky bastards with time on their hands don’t understand the virtues of sleep. I mean, sex _is_ nice, but…”

“It’s overrated”, the bounty hunter firmly acquiesced. “The physical part, I can get on my own, and the social one… Well, it’s seldom worth the effort invested.”

“You know what I miss? What I really miss in relationships? Easiness.”

“Oh, kriff yes. Not having to explain anything, or to work to impress the other…”

“Just being your fully imperfect self along someone who does the same. _That_ felt nice.”

It had been like that with Clovis, for a while - before their jobs started clashing too much for them to keep ignoring it. She still had this kind of comfort with Sabé, but it wasn’t the same – her former handmaiden and lifelong best friend was happily involved with another, and even though she insisted that Padmé could still jump in any time she liked, she had grown past being a secondary party in her relationships. She didn’t trust herself not to get frustrated with it, and Sabé didn’t deserve that.

There had been others, there might be some again too (for some reason, Anakin spontaneously appeared into her mind); but they had never reached that kind of lazy intimacy. She liked Ani, more than she dared to admit, but the way he looked at her really wasn’t the one she longed for.

Fett snorted, as if he had read her mind.

“Not easy to get to that point when everyone insists putting you onto a pedestal, is it?”

 “You’re one to talk”, she retorted. “I can’t imagine the most fearsome bounty hunter in the galaxy gets to leave his socks around.”

“I don’t leave my socks around”, he sagely replied. “That’s unsanitary.”

“Well, I do.”

“You’re nasty, senator.”

She stuck her tongue out at him, and Fett shook his head.

There was a moment of silence, during which they just looked at one another again; except this time, it wasn’t uncomfortable tension that tinged the air, but an eerie feeling of connection.

Time seemed to slow down, and Padmé felt her heart beat faster.

“Can I ask you a question?” she whispered, her voice so soft it was barely audible in the strangely hushed atmosphere.

Very slowly, Jango nodded.

“If they tell you to do it… To kill me, I mean.”

Her voice broke a little, and she licked her lips before pursuing.

“Will you?”

Silence lasted longer this time, and the bounty hunter had averted his eyes. She was suddenly scared that she had driven him off, that the unlikely bond they had inadvertently built had just snapped; and then, as it usually did with her, anger replaced fear.

Her voice was so low in her throat that it almost sounded like a growl.

“Look at me.”

Fett glanced at her, and reported his look back onto his hands.

“Look. At. Me”, Padmé snarled. “Don’t you dare looking away. You don’t get to do that.”

The man stiffened, and his face was icily neutral when he finally answered.

“Yes. I will.”

The young woman felt something knotting around her stomach, so cold it burnt.

“Why?”

“It’s my job.”

His voice was back to the detached apathy that made her want to scream, and she clenched her jaw hard to prevent herself from lashing out. She closed her eyes, trying to even her breathing, forcing the tears she felt coming back down her throat.

She heard him get up, and her eyes snapped open.

“Is that what you want? Is that who you want to be?”

“It’s who I am”, Fett simply said.

For a second, she was tempted to believe him, to let him walk away and give in to her rage and her despair, but something in the memories of their talk stopped her.

“Liar.”

The bounty hunter stilled in the door frame. He hadn’t turned back to look at her, but Padmé didn’t care.

“Liar”, she repeated, softer this time. “I’ve heard you talk to your son. I’ve seen the way you look at me. You are not one of these empty shells of people who are past feeling anything. You know how I feel right now.”

She swallowed, conscious to play her last card.

“Look at me. Please.”

For a second that seemed to last an eternity, Jango didn’t move. Then his shoulders sagged, and a deep exhale made its way past his lips. He begrudgingly turned around, and leaned back against the wall as his eyes met hers.

“Why did you come in here?” Padmé softly asked.

The intensity of Fett’s gaze was burning its way straight into her head.

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“Why?”

“Because they wouldn’t.”

She barely stifled a laugh.

“So you thought you would come and keep me company?”

“Call me old-fashioned, but ignoring one of your prisoners is just bad manners in my book.”

Laughter escaped her then, raw and deep and desperate, and shook her until her belly hurt.

“You are unbelievable”, she managed between hiccups.

Fett shrugged, but a brief smile passed on his face again.

“For that matter”, he casually added, “yours need serious overhauling.”

“What?”

“Ignoring your visitors isn’t very polite, senator”, he sternly stated. “I wondered for how long you would keep doing that.”

“Is that why you stayed?” Padmé squealed, still trying to catch her breath. “Did you just want to overpetty me?”

“I was bored”, the bounty hunter admitted. “They asked me to stay here, but I’m not allowed in the Council room, and they’ve been in there for _hours_.”

“Oh, sweet mother of…”

“Language, milady.”

Padmé bit her tongue until she managed to calm down a little, and looked back at him.

“How do you ever manage to get your job done?”

“Well, for starters, I don’t usually chat with my targets.”

“Oh, so I’m special, that’s what you’re saying?”

He rolled his eyes, but there was a strange fondness in his gaze.

“Yeah. I guess so.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> (I have no idea how to cut this thing into chapters? It's a bit long, so have Part 1 here. Next up, more talking, clones, revelations, and SMUT - or maybe not, depending if it fits in Part 2 or if I need to expand.) (Let's face it, I'm probably gonna have to expand. Stay tuned for Kinky Times, folks.)


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